We are on our way...

Well almost on our way. It is 1 AM my time and I am not sleeping. I never sleep much the night before a trip. I guess I keep thinking about everything and making sure I haven't forgot anything. It isn't just the packing that takes time for a trip, it is getting your house in order. I can not stand to leave a dirty house, nor any dirty clothes when I leave. We have all of the suitcases packed and we each only have one. Well, except Lance, he has two. One suitcase and one hanging bag. I think we did pretty good on keeping the load light. I feel like my Memaw when she goes to stay with my Uncle Tim for a month. She always packs her suitcase halfway because she shops for clothes while she is there and she wants to have room in her suitcase to bring it home. I definately want to have plenty of room to bring things home.

Evelyn's class Holiday party was sooo excellent today. The kids just absolutely loved decorating the ginger bread house. Unfortunately, my camera battery was dead so I took pictures with my phone. I am not sure how to get the pictures onto the computer from my phone, so stay turned for them.

9 Hours until take off....Houston here we come....

2010-12-15

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This is a collection of what we have been doing the past week. The following blog will explain it all. Enjoy...

We are getting ready....

Let's see...where to began. This past weekend was pretty good except I got Evelyn's stomach virus. Yuck. So I was a little slow getting moving on Friday. Infact we all hung out and relaxed most of the day. In the evening, though we left and went into the city for supper and to look at the lights at night. I feels like Christmas with all of the lights here, even thought they do not celebrate it. The city is full of lights from the National Day.

Saturday we went to the school for Breakfast with Santa. Evelyn had a great time playng with all of her friends on the playground. Ofcourse our first thing on the aggenda was to see the big guy himself. Evelyn was great. She told him exactly what she wanted for Christmas and that she was going to be in Texas. Camille...well...she screamed. She was even shaking, she was so scared. Poor thing. The girls got a picture with Santa and then we all got together and took a family photo with Santa. Camille is crying in both...well it is what it is. After breakfast with Santa we went to my dear friend's appartment (Kim). They have not been in the appartment for long because they have been trying to sort out maintenance problems since August. Well it was well worth the wait. I think they most have the best view in the entire city. It is a lovely appartment and we hung out there the rest of the day visiting with good friends. Not to mention eating some great chinese food.

Sunday, Evelyn woke up with a cold and a cough so I kept her home from school. As well as Monday. Well, I was on my way to bring Evelyn to school on Monday when she just coughed and coughed all the way, so I did not bring her. Instead the girls and I went to the corniche and had a breakfast picnic by the water. It was so nice. Then we did a little shopping and headed home for rest and relaxation. Monday night Evelyn took a nice warm shower, rubbed down with vicks, and some cold medicine...the next morning she was a new person.

Sunday night was Lance's company Holiday party. We had a lovely time. I really enjoyed meeting everyone, their spouces, and children. We are so lucky that Lance works with such a nice group of people, they treat us like family. The food was excellent and I made the table decorations. Everything turned out great.

Tuesday Camille woke with the same cold and running a fever. I took her to the pedi and he told me to do exactly what I was doing...tylenol and saline nasal spray. Today she is doing much better. I think everyone is going to be OK by the time we fly out. OH, Lance has the cold too.

The rest of the time this week I have been getting things ready for us to leave. Someone is coming to our house to take care of Ruffles and Fraizer...I hope they are going to be OK. I have been packing suitcases and getting the house in order. The hole in our backyard was finially filled back up yesterday after 3 weeks. So far it appears the work they did was successful. Evelyn had a field trip yesterday to the Heritage Village and they had a great time. I didn't go because I am going to leave Camille with a babysitter today so I can stay with Evelyn at school for her party and activities.

We have lots of great things planned for today for Evelyn's Holiday party. We are going to decorate a giant gingerbread house with candy (I made the house out of cardboard), make reindeer candycanes, and decorated gingerbread men. The eveyone is bringing a pot luck dish specific to their herritage at the end of the day. I was planning on bringing meatballs, but when I started to cook them last night, they just fell apart. It turned into one giant meatball. OK...plan B...going to the deli this Am and getting something from there to bring.

We are ready to head home for the Holidays...."I'll be home for Christmas"... Just pray that Chicago weather cooraporates, that we can get in and get out. Until then....

ONE MORE WEEK

That is right just one week away and we will be on our way to see all of you. We just can not wait.

Thursday, Lance had a board meeting that he has been preparing for for about a month now. I am very proud to say that it went very well. In fact the CEO told me last night how impressed he was with Lance's speaking skills. He didn't have to tell me that. The board was pleased with Lance and his vision of what to do next year with the company. Lance is very happy and now can relax that it is behind him. Now he can concentrate on coming home for the holidays.

Last night Lance and I attended the Almonsori 33 years anniversary party. You see Almonsori and Nalco (who Lance works for) combine in a joint venture to form Emmochem, the company Lance works with in Abu Dhabi. It was a very interesting party to say the least. It was set outside along the water which was beautiful. Everyone and I mean everyone who works for almonsori was there. First they served dinner buffet style and then dessert the same. Then the CEO of the company started the show. Boy was it ever a show. Of course they handed out rewards for the employee of the year, etc. But that wasn't all. Throughout the evening employees of almonsori would but on various performances for the audience. Apparently, that is what is custom for this company, the employees put on a talent show and at the end of the night everyone votes on the best act. I will have to say that Lance and I did enjoy one of the acts, the CEO of the company (who is from Yemen), the owner of the company Mr. Almonsori himself (emiratie), and a coon ass from Louisiana sang "Down on the Bayou". I promise, I am not lying. The suprising part was the emiratie knew all of the words. Too funny. This party did give me the chance to meet some very important and not to mention very wealth people. I was glad to put a face to the names of people when Lance talks about them. Altogether, we had a very entertaining night.

Water Issues

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After I wrote the blog following this one, I decided to take some pics of the maintence going on in our backyard or what they call garden. I know I have mentioned before our ongoing problems with our water. Sometime our water will just not work. Meaning when you turn on the tap nothing comes out. That means no shower, toilet flushing, even washing hands. It is very bothersom, esp when Lance is trying to get ready to go to work. What causes this problem? Well our water has to be pumped into our house and the underground hole were the pump lives gets flooded. Which inturn the pump gets wet and then shorts out. When this happens, someone has to come and pump out the water and then they blow the pump dry. Then we have water again. Like I said this has been going on and on and on and on and on. Infact two weeks ago we lost water 3 times in 2 days. I had enough, so I went up to the service office. So since then, they started working to fix the leak problem that causes my pump house to flood. There has been a huge hole in the back for the past week and 1/2 were these men come occasionaly to work on our problem. I think, but not going to get my hopes up, that they will finish today. The only problem now is were the durt that they dug up has been laying for the past 1 1/2 week, my grass is underneath and is now dead. We'll tackle that problem when we get there. So these pictures were just taken of two men working to "water proof" my pump house in our backyard/garden.

2010 Delcambre Abu Dhabi Christmas

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We had a great week last week. Plans are in the making for Evelyn's school Christmas party and Lance's work christmas party. Both I am working on. Imagine that. I hope you enjoy the pictures of the house decorated. It is way less than what we are used to doing for the holidays, but we decided to only bring the minimal here and leave the rest in storage. 20 boxes went to storage to be exact. To be honest it is really nice not to have to do alllll of that decorating. We have really enjoyed our tree and decorations.

Last Thursday was National day here. The day 39 years ago the UAE became a country. You would not believe how patriot these people are here. In the pictures above I put some pics of my neighbors car. Lots of people decorate their vehicles for the day. That night they ride around the city honking, etc. They even spray some kind of foam spray and silly string on eveyone. There was also a big fireworks show on the corniche. We did see some extreme cars that day. One had a giant teddy bear on top, some covered completely with feather boas in the nations colors, etc. We did not join in the festivities on the island that night because we heard it was too wild and Lance had lots of work to do anyhow. We did join a party at the club house and it was very nice. The locals brought food for everyone to tast and the kids played games.

We had a 4 day weekend this weekend. Thursday was National Day, Friday and Saturday the weekend, and Sunday was a muslim religious day. Lance worked at home most of the weekend while the girls and I hung out. Evelyn played with the neighborhood kids mostly. Lance is preparing for his end of the year board meeting and trying to get all of the reports together. Yesterday, however, (saturday) we went to Dubai. We went to a really nice souk to do some Christmas shopping and then we went to one of lance's co-workers home for BBQ. We had a great time. They have two girls and the kids played soo good. They have a very nice house with a pool and they can see the burj khalifa from their house (tallest building in the world) as well as the sailboat hotel that I can not remember the name of.

So that brings us to today. Evelyn has the day off and so did Lance, but he opted to go to work so he could work on the end of the year stuff. The girls and I are hanging out while some workers are repairing our water pump issue in the back. We are going to go sign Evelyn up for dance today and that will start when we get back from the holidays. Plus we are going grocery shopping. Nothing too excitting. Dad, I wished you were here to see what they are doing in our backyard. They have some torch thing. I have no idea what they are doing. I will have to take pics for you.

We are beyond excitted to be going home soon. 12 days from today to be exact. We just can not wait.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: Well I have been pleasently supprised how their is lots of Christmas here. Esp since it is a primarily muslim country. You can even buy a real tree and I saw real poinsettas at the store yesterday. Lots of the hotels have christmas tree lightings and concerts as well. We are going to see santa next weekend at the school's Breakfast with Santa event.

Weekend Report

We had a great weekend following a great Thanksgiving. Friday we went to church, or at least most of church. We ran into my friend Kim outside and chatted for a while, so we missed a little bit of mass. After mass we headed to the Abu Dhabi Gold Club and had lunch at the club house outside overlooking the course. It was really nice, but the service was terrible. They were hosting a craft bazaar at the golf course, so after we ate, we walked around to see some local crafts. Really neat stuff and we even picked up a few Christmas gifts. Then we headed to the Exhibition Center for the Date Palm Festival. We really enjoyed that. The set up date palms for people to climb...very interesting. They also had areas with women doing local crafts like basket weaving and hena (temporary tatoos on hands). We had a great day. We got home in time to eat leftover turkey for dinner and enjoy a family bike ride throughout the compound. Saturday, we hung around the house mostely. We are having a lots of problems with our water and we lost water for the 4th time this week on Saturday. So we were watching the guys yet again pump out the water from the pump house because it flooded, etc etc. My backyard AKA garden is currently sporting a big hole due to the service company trying to prevent this problem from happening. Well since they started working, it has gotten worse. We ate out for dinner Saturday night at the golf club next door to our compound. It was my first time to go there and I was really impressed. Plus, they have all you can eat sushi on Monday nights. Yum. I can see ourselves going there a lot. Well that is about all that happened over the weekend and now we are starting our week. This weeks agenda: plan Evelyn's class Christmas party and Christmas shopping.

19 days until we come home!!!

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: National Day is this week here in the UAE. It is the day that they celebrate the birth of this contry. This year is their 39th anniversary. They have fresh flowers planted everywhere and lots of lights for the event. They are going to have a big military parade up the island and a huge firework show over the corniche.

Thanksgiving 2010

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I would first like to wish all of you a very Happy Thanksgiving. We are so thankful for all of our blessings. We are especially thankful for all of our family and friends. We feel like we are the luckiest family to have so many people who love and care about us. Thanks so much to all of you who have supported us this year with our big move. We could not have survived it without all of your love, support, and prayers. I have to thank God as well for all of my blessing he has given me: a wonderful husband and two precious little girls. God is good.

We had a great Thanksgiving. The girls and I worked today to prepare our mini Thanksgiving Feast and Lance worked. He was not planning on going to work today, but there were some last minute things that came up and he was needed. All is well, I did not see why he needed to take the day off on our account, we spent the evening together eatting and hanging out as a family. I have to give myself a pat on the back over my menu. Lance does not like most of the traditional Thanksgiving food, but I tried to stick to the usuals. I had roasted turkey breast and gravy, mashed potatoes, rice dressing, green bean casserole, rolls, and dessert: bread pudding. It all turned out really well. Everyone liked the dinner as well. As you can see in the pictures, we taste tested the bread pudding before dinner and ate almost half the dish. Lance loves bread pudding.

While the girls and I were waiting for Lance to get home we watched Julie and Julia. That move is so cute and I really liked it. If you have not seen it you need to. I could relate the Julie because it is a story about her writing a blog. Really cute. But I was super super excitted to see that the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade come on TV here. I just could not believe it. In fact I told several people about thanksgiving and how we always watch that parade in the morning. The girls were loving the parade and were dancing and Camille was screming at the TV.

I do miss seeing you all today, but I am not depressed because we will be home in 3 weeks from tomorrow. Wow that is coming up quick. I do miss reading the huge sales ads today though. It was always fun to see the amazing sales that were going to happen on Black Friday. Well I guess I can check them out on line.

After we ate supper and skyped some of you, we started putting our Christmas decorations up. We have a small tree compared to my four that I had in Katy. We only brought 2 containers of decorations and left 20 boxes behind in storage. I brought tree ortaments, stocking, nativity scene, and my dad's letter he wrote to santa when he was 10. I have to admit I am releaved that I don't have to do all of that decorating this year. I used to spent one or two weekends putting everything together inside and out for the holidays. Although, I really love to decorate and to look at the results, I am excitted to not have all of that work to do. Just relax and enjoy the holiday. The girls were so cute in helping with the tree. We did have a few ortaments get broken. Camille mistaked a ball ortament for a real ball and she threw it on the ground like it was going to bounce. That was the first casulty of the night and 3 more followed. We ooooud and aaaud at all of the ortaments and talked about everyone and how pretty they were. It was just so cute how the girls got so excitted.

We had a great Thanksgiving and we hope you did too.

The past weekend was really plesent. We got up, got ready and went to church Friday morning, but when we arrived we found out that they were not having that mass on that day. The next mass was an hour later and was in Philipino language. I guess we got an A for effert. We then headed to Dubai to go check out the Dubai Garden Center. We stopped at a small mall for lunch and ended up staying there all day. We didn't make it to the garden center, but I did buy my Christmas tree. Yeah, we will be putting it up later this week. Saturday we relaxed at home. I pulled out all of the girl's winter clothes and washed them. It took me two days to get them all clean. So today I cleaned Camille's closet and took out all of the clothes she out grew etc etc.

There are a lot of kids Evelyn's age in the hood and now that the weather is nice they are all playing in the street in the evening. This is so great. I am so glad that Evelyn has made so many friends and they all can play together. I am liking were we chose to live more and more each day. I think I am even getting used to the drive into the city.

We are so excitted to come in for the holidays and we are counting down the days until we come...24 from today.

We don't have any big plans for Thanksgiving. I am going to cook a small feast for us on the big turkey day. Also this week, Abu Dhabi is having a Date Palm Festival that I plan to go check out as well as another craft Bazaar on Friday. Well that is what is going on over here pretty much.

I would like to request all of my friends and family to please pray for Lance's grandfather AKA: Grumps. He had open heart surgery 2 weeks ago and last week had a set back that sent him back to surgery as well as ICU. We are thinking about him and our family every day. He is doing better now, and we hope that every day gets better and better for him. We love you Grumps.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: Last week I bought some pants at a store that were a little too long. No problem they said, they have a seamstress that can take them up for you. Apparently this is a common thing, when you go to a store if the clothes don't fit right, they can alter them for you. Talk about service.

The girls

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Here are just some random pictures of the girls over the last week. We have had a great time this week. Evelyn was out of school for the Eid Holiday and Lance had most of the week off. One thing you would all like to know is that we made our flight reservations for the holiday break. We will arrive in Houston on Friday, December 17th. We will be in for over two weeks and hope to visit and see all of you during that time. We miss everyone and can not wait to see you.

Following this post I made several posts today. The last one is the Formula One post. If you do not reach that one, click the "older posts" button on the bottom right and it will bring up more. Hope you enjoy.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: It is true that the local people are very family oriented and they enjoy the simple things, like spending time together. That is one of the main things that Eid is all about, seeing as many people as you can...as one of Lance's co-workers explained to me. Well now the temperature is pleasent outside. Only down to the 60's. In the evenings now in any park or grassy area families and friends will join and BBQ. It is a real strange sight for us to see people sitting on lawn chairs along side of the road in a circle eatting and visiting. But they don't care were they are, they just care that they are together. That is kind of how we feel about us living here, so far away from home. We don't care really were we are, as long as we are together. That is what makes me the happiest anyways, being with my husband and two precious girls. Living here and experiencing everyday with them is undescribable!

We've gone coocoo for CoCo Puffs

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This past week since Evelyn was out of school, we volunteered to take the class guinea pig, CoCo Puffs, home and take care of her. We have absolutely loved having her and the girls have really enjoyed her. Well, Evelyn has enjoyed her, Camille is not too sure about her. Evelyn gets to take her out of her cage once a day and let CoCo Puffs roam around in her room. The door is closed ofcourse or Ruffles and Fraizer would have CoCo Puffs for lunch. The guinea pig is soo sweet and never bites. She is pretty easy to take care of as well. This was a good experience for us because Evelyn wants to buy a small pet with her Christmas money after we get back. (This will give her something to look forward to when we get back) At first she thought she wanted fish, then maybe a guinea pig, but now she wants something smaller than a guinea pig. Perhaps hampsters. We looked at some at a pet store this week and I told her she would not be able to take them out of the cage like CoCo because they may get lost (they are very active) but she really like them and loves how they run on a wheel and climb through a tunnel. Well CoCo Puff has been a delight and she will return back to the classroom on Sunday.

Evelyn Grocery Shopping

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I usually grocery shop on sundays when Evelyn is at school. Same routine as when we were home, just Sunday instead of Monday. Well the past two Sundays Evelyn was off from school. I decided to use this time as a opportunity for learning and something to keep her interest while we are shopping. She looked through a book at home and made her shopping list. She copied the words by the pictures of the things she needed to get at the store. Then we loaded up her grocery cart and headed to Carrefour. She pushed it all through the store along side me and got all of the things on her list. We had a great time doing this and Evelyn felt empowered because she could do it as well. I am really proud of her.

Al Ain

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So all this week Evelyn was off of school and Lance had most of the week off as well due to the Eid Holiday. We hung around the house mostly and relaxed, but on Wednesday we decided to make a day trip to Al Ain. It is about 1 1/2 hour drive from our house. A good analogy would be Al Ain is to Abu Dhabi and Beaumont is to Houston. Al Ain hold a special place in the hearts of the local people because it is the birth place of Sheik Zayed, the father of the UAE and the man who had vision for the future of the UAE. We found Al Ain to be suprisingly beautiful. Every street was lined with trees and folage. Every round about of intersection had a fountain of statue. The street lights were black rod iron like New Orleans. Also, alone the side of the city is a mountain, Jebel Hafeet, whick you can drive a windy road up it and there is a hotel on top. We picked a great place to visit, but we pick the wrong time to go. Because it was Eid, everyone was off and everyone was vacationing. Al Ain also has a zoo that is associated with the San Diego Zoo and that was our first stop. The zoo was suprisingly pretty good. Not all of the animals you would see at Houston, but nicely layed out. The only problem was the crowdedness. I didn't now if the stinch was coming from the animals of the people around us. Ewwww. I did get aggrivated twice when adult would move infront of my girls to see an animal when we were patiently waiting our turn. The girls had a really good time and we even ate snow cones. After we left the zoo, we headed to drive up the mountain. It was perfect timing just before sunset. Well so did everyone else, the traffic line was rediculously too long and we would never have made it up the mountain. We decided to come back another time to drive up the moutain. We then headed to the Al Ain Mall because there were several signs around town advertising a circus act at the mall. We saw a clown act while we ate our supper (Pizza Hut). Then we had some delicious ice cream at this old timey looking ice cream parlor. The girls loved it. By this time it was dark and we headed back home. We had a great time in Al Ain and we will be back.

Formula 1

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This past Sunday we enjoyed our evening at the Yar Marina Circiut at the Formula One Championship race. It was soo exhilirating. You can not believe the energy and excitement that overcomes you just being there. The cars are louder than you could ever imagine. They gave us some ear plugs that did help some, but we could not carry any type of conversation during the race. We had perfect seats that were right at the start and finish lines. On top of that we looked right onto the pit area, so we saw all of the action. The race track was beautiful and passed by a marina that had larger than life yaghts parkes along side the track with people watching from them. The track also ran through the Yas Hotel. The Yas Island were all of this took place and were the new indoor Ferrari World lives is only about 15 minutes drive from our house. Due to the masses of people coming to this event, we had to drive in the opposite direction to catch a shuttle bus to bring us there. It took about one hour just to get there. The race was hard to follow because we could not hear the commentator over the car noise and the screnes were difficult to read. It was pretty neat to see the cars pit and change tires. It would only take them 5-7 seconds to change all four tires. After the race was over we walked to the arena to watch Prince. He put on a pretty good show, but we didn't stay until the end. I wanted to hear Purple Rain, but opted to beat the crowd out instead. Plus we had been gone all after noon and I wanted to go home to see about the girls. By the way they did great. My Emirate neighbors had Evelyn over to play part of the time the sitter was here. Everything went great. We will definately be back to see the race next year and this time I am going to try to follow the races leading up to the final.

Our Church

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Above are some pictures from the past and some from the present. I ran across a few picture I haven't posted from Melinda and Dennis's trip. You will also see a few picture of Dragon Mart. I spoke about that in the past, that is were you can buy just about anything. We got some drapes from there.

Then you will see some picture of our church. I can not describe why it has been hard to get motivated to go to church here. I can just say that it is different. Our first trip to church kind of spoiled it for us because we went at the most crowded time and Camille was tired on top of that. there is no cry room, so we thought, how are we going to do this. Every time we go now it just gets easier and better. We have gone to different times and even some that were held in the hall. We have always stood in the back of the church because we have Camille in the stroller and it is so crowded. We may not be exactly on time every time, but we make it there. I posted some picture of the church and hall on the above link so check it out. What is so crazy about this place is it is located on the "churches area" this is the only area in abu dhabi that has any other religion other than Muslim. Although, right next door to the catholic church is a muslim mosque. There is also a episcopal church and a church of England. Everyone prayinga and worshiping on harmony in one block. It is pretty amazing. We are so lucky to be in a country that allows other religions to practice.

Well on Friday we went to the morning mass and then went to the Al Raha Beach Hotel were I read that they have a lunch buffet. It was fantastic. There was everything on the buffet you could imagine....lobster, crab, lamb, Indian food, Lebenese food, etc. There was even a seperate buffet for children. No, this is not like Golden Coral. It was really really nice. A view of the water, live music, even entertainment for the kids. I have pictures for you to see. Oh and the desert buffet was so beautiful. I could have ate it all.

After we ate lunch, we went to Dubai to pick up my living room drapes we ordered last weekend. Today we hung around the house and hung drapes. We booked our flights to come in for the holidays. Then we had reservations tonight to eat with some customers of Lance's who are coming in for the Formula One race, but there were running way too late for dinner. We already had a babysitter, so Lance and I ate dinner together. We had a nice and quiet evening.

So this weekend is the big Grand Prix Formula One Championship race. Courtesy of Lance's work we are going tomorrow for the final race and to see Prince in concert. The race is over 3 days and there is concerts all over the city. The city is hopping with things to do for the Formula One. I will take pics for all of you to see. I am really excitted to go and experience it. I don't know if I am as excitted to see Prince, but it should be entertaining. My babysitter, Anna, is not availabe tomorrow, so I have been in a dilema to find a babysitter. I did find someone today though and it will all work out.

Evelyn is out of school all of next week because it is the second Eid holiday for the Muslims. Many people take vacations during this week break. We thought about going somewere close, but decided to lay cool this week. We are going to take some day trips to places near by and maybe work in the garden aka flower beds.


WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: No one can own a home here except the locals, so everyone rents. Rent is very high and is paid one year in advance. To live in an appartment or villa (house) that is comparable to the average home in the US, you would spend around 200,000 AED per year which is a little less than $55,000 US.

Weekend report

Well sorry again about the delay in my blog. Yet again, I had internet problems, then Lance had to take my computer to work because his was sent off to the States for updating from the company. So as for now we are back on track.

We had a nice weekend last weekend. Thursday was our parent teacher conference with Evelyn's teacher and that went well. We have some plans in order for her teacher to send things home from school so we can work with her at home. Evelyn is not interested in the lessons all of the time at school because she is more interested in socializing. We are working on helping her to understand how to pay attention and when is the correct time to play and not. Thursday evening we attended one of Evelyn's classmates birthday party. It was at this place called Fun City and imaging chuky cheese on steroids. There are small roller coasters, games, jumps, etc. Lots of fun. After playing then they put on a show for the kids with costumed characters. The kids loved it and had a really great time. I was able to visit with some other moms from the class and we had a great discussion about all things in general.

Friday we all slept in (except for Evelyn who stays on school timing and never sleeps past 7 am) we relaxed and did things around the house. We then went to 5:30 pm mass. We have not gone to church as often as we should to be perfectly honest. It is all together a different enviroment which makes it more challenging to get motivated to go. We decided to go to this mass, because it is in the hall and we thought it may be a better atmosphere for our kids. The biggest challenge with church is that there is no cry room or nursery. It makes it very difficult to pay attention when you are trying to entertain a toddler for one hour. This time we decided to bring Camille in her stroller, which worked out PERFECTLY. She stays quiet and more managable when she is contained in her stroller. The girls looked at books and ate cracker and we made it through mass. Next weekend we are going to try the morning children's mass to see if that is better for us. After mass we went out to dinner at this upscale Mexican Restaurant. The atmosphere was great and the girls loved the live enterainment, but the food was not so great. Don't think we will go back.

Sunday we went to Dubai and back to Dragon Mart. It is like Harwin Street in a mall. This is the place to get drapes for a very resonable price. And that we did. We got the remaining needed drapes for our house: master bed, game room, and living room. We have 4 windows in the living room and the drapes are not going to be ready until this coming weekend so we will return to pick them up. The other rooms were made that day and we brought them home with us. Talk about fast service. The best part was the price. We bought our master bed drapes and game room drapes for $80 US total. Now the fabric may not have been what I would have picked in the states, but it matches and looks stylish. This is a temporary home, so why spend a lot of money? Our four windows in the living room...we got panels and sheers to go behind them...we spent $260 US total. Great shopping day in Dubai

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: When local men here greet one another, esp if they are good friends of relatives they rub noses, like eskimos. It is really funny to see them do this.

Breakfast Club

A few moms came over this morning for coffee, tea, and treats. We are all new to Abu Dhabi and it is fun to compare stories and share our discoveries. We all really enjoy visiting and half of the day is over before we know it. Most of us have a toddler, so the kids play while we chat. Evelyn had a playdate with some kids in her class today after school. We just stayed at school and let the kids play on the playground. Camille played on the playground as well and she had a great time. Both girls were exhausted by the time we got home and I had to carry them both inside. Evelyn is now off for a 4 day weekend. We have parent teacher conference day tomorrow and on Sunday (remember our weekend is on friday and saturday). Lance and I are going to meet with Evelyn's teacher tomorrow afternoon while Anna watches the girls.

What is different in Abu Dhabi: For some reason, and I just don't know why, but most of the locals cover their car seats in plastic. It is like they didn't take the plastic cover from the factory off. I don't know if they are trying to keep the seats clean or do they want everyone to think their vehicle is brand new because it still has the plastic. I surely wouldn't want to sit on a seat covered with plastic on a got summer day. Talk about sticky.

Halloween 2010

Just click on this picture and then press the slide show button.

The Delcambres in Abu Dhabi

Just click on this picture and you will be able to view a lot of my pictures. They are some of the hilights from Melinda and Dennis's trip. Hope you enjoy and I will get more soon. Once you click the picture on the next screne select slideshow in the top left corner.

Candy

This is Camille digging in the goody bag after Trick or Treating. Too funny.


Today I went to a playgroup at St. Andrew's church for the first time. It was all Westerners, some UK and some American. That made it nice. It was pretty good. The kids just free played and they had several different stations to choose from...obstical course, kitchen, craft table, train, books and puzzles, etc. We had a nice time and I could see us going back regularly.

Tomorrow I am expecting a couple of moms to come over in the morning for coffee and breakfast. We all have toddlers and are all pretty new to Abu Dhabi. I am serving coffee, tea, arabic tea, monkey break, chocolate croussants, and fruit. It should be good. Evelyn has another playdate after school tomorrow. This time it is at the school on the playground with a lot of other class mates. Just time for us parents to visit and let the kiddos play.

We have all come down with a small cold this week and Evelyn lost her voice yesterday. That still hasn't stopped her as you can imagine. No fever, just a little stopped up nose. We are all taking some over the counter sinus medicine coutesy of Melinda bringing us a stock on her last trip. They do have medicine here, but it is not familiar to me and i am unsure of the dosage for the girls. I am just sticking with what I know for now. It seems to be working well and we are all getting better everyday.

Happy Halloween Everyone

Sorry about the delay in posts, but you would be so suprised to know that I had internet problems. Not only could I not fix it, but I did not have the password to connect to our server. We received our password when we openned the account, but I put the card with the password in a location that I would always know were it was...in my wallet. Well you know the rest...my wallet got stollen and now I don't have the password. On top of it all they will not tell you your password, you have to go to the etisilat building and pay for a new one. And of course the account is in Lance's name which means they would not give me a new one. I had to wait for Lance to get home from Oman and he went to get a new password. So now here I am finally blogging. I am going to run a recap on the past week of events.

Last weekend: We went to the Abu Dhabi beach for the first time. It was very nice, except it was pretty crowded. We made the mistake of going on a Friday which is everyone's day off. The beach was packed and we were the minority nationality on the beach. I think we could have went to other beach areas and even paid to go to the beach and we would have seen more of our kid of peeps. Needless to say we were the main attraction on the beach and some people were even taking pictures of us. I kind of felt like I was a celebrity. It is obvious some of them do not swim often because they did not have appropriate swim wear...unless you want to call swimming in underwear appropriate. We had a great time anyways. We ended our evening walking the cornich and eatting beach side at an Italian restaurant. Saturday we did some shopping for the house.

Last Sunday: I went to breakfast with a friend from Evelyn's school. It was three of us ladies and our little kiddos. We visited for quite a while and the kids played. We are going to try to do it more often at each other's house...infact they are all coming over to our house this Wednesday after dropping off the kids at school.

Last Monday: It was one of those super accomplishing days. I did lots of errands and got lots done. The hilight of the day was finding some things at Spinneys(grocery store) that I haven't seen in a while...jiffy cornbread mix (got 4 boxes)and Weight Watchers chocolate muffins ($7 US per box of 3).

Last Tuesday: Hung out at home...laudry etc. Remeber Lance is out of town this week, he left on sunday and will return Thursday. He was in oman. I called the internet company for tech support while Camille was napping this day. I got this nice man from Pakistan on the phone...he thought he would take that opportunity to educate me on Islam and what is wrong with the world today. I was on the phone for over an hour with this man and needless to say...no internet....it was one of the most interesting conversations by far and it is one for the books.

Last Wednesday: Anna come over early and watched Camille while I brought evelyn to school. After class began, Evelyn's class helped me make a life sized scarecrow. They had a great time and they were so proud that they had made it. It looked great at our booth and we moved him by their garden after the festival was over.

Last Thursday: I set up the booth for the Fall festival with some help of others in the morning. Camille came with me and hung out in her stroller most of the time. she was a trouper. After we finished the booth (we were hot and swetty) I took Evelyn out of school early. That way she could go home and rest for the fall festival and it would save me a trip back to pick her up. We all went home ate lunch and rested, then picked Lance up at the airport. Lance was able to catch a flight home earlier than scheduled. THANK GOD! we all got ready and went to the fall Festival. I have to say that it was the best Fall Festival I have ever seen. The entire school was decorated. The night began with the kids parading in by class showing off their costumes. Then they all went to play games at the booths. It was so big, I didn't see it all. I worked our class booth most of the night because none of the parents signed up to work the booth. Only two helped the entire night. I think most people here are not used to doing for themselves being most everyone has a house maid, so why would they work a booth at the school festival? We had a great night anyways.

Friday: Evelyn and I met one of her classmates, her mother, and her sister at the Abu Dhabi National Theater for Sleeping Beauty. We were so excitted to go and especially be with some friends. But I can honestly say it was the worst play I have ever been to. I think highschool plays are better than that. It was a UK cast and the humor was not appropriate for kids. It wasn't even the story of Sleeping Beauty, it was a lot of odd scits. It is hard for me to explain, but I could have wanted my money back. The best part was visiting with our friends.

Saturday: Another weekend day of shopping in Abu Dhabi. We thought we might go to Dubai, but opted to stay in town.

Sunday: Halloween. One of the Sheiks of another emirate died this past friday and in likes of that, there is to be no celebrations, parties, dancing, etc for one week in respect for him and the morners. This is a custom here in the UAE. We had a scheduled party at our clubhouse for Halloween, but it was reschedule for this coming friday. We still Trick or Treated as well as everyone else in the hood, including Emirates. My Emirate neighbor's son and their maid walked around with us to trick or treat. The girls had the best time. Camille caught on to the routine and was begging for candy like all of the kids. She even managed to get some of the candy out of the wrapper while riding in her wagon from door to door. As respect to those who do not celebrate Halloween, the compound handed out papers of pumpkins to tape onto your door if you wanted to participate. We did not have any problem with handing out all of our candy, infact we ran out pretty early in the night. That is OK, we rather all be together trick or treating. It was a great night. You wouldn't believe how many kids were out trick or treating with their nannies. That is not right. The parents can't bring their own kids to trick or treat? Most of them were emirate kids that had their nannies with them.

Today: Well after a night of trick or treating we all woke up this morning with a cold. Yep, everyone but Ruffles and Fraizer. That actually is pretty good for us, Lance and Evelyn ususally have lots of hayfever by now. No hay...No hay fever. Lance had a big international petroleum conference today. Evelyn went home with her classmate (and secret admiror) Jeebu after school for a playdate. She stayed for a while and I picked her up before supper time. They had a great time. They live in a nice appartment with a view of the water.

Tomorrow: I am going to meet some of my breakfast club moms (that is what I call them) at a church playgroup tomorrow morning. I am really excitted to check it out. It is time for me to get some organized playdates or something for Camille.

After viewing other blogs, I realized how sad my appears. I am currently working on updating the looks of my blog. Stay tuned your going to like it....

Sorry it has been so long since I wrote. After Melinda and Dennis left, Lance left the next day. So it has been just the girls and I all week, may I say no more. When there is only one set of hands around the house, I have to run a tight ship. That means that I am exhausted by the end of the day and instead of staying up to write on the blog, I am sleeping in my bed.

This week has been a typical week altogether. Thanks to Melinda and Dennis helping out around the house, I feel settled now. I have been just catching up on emails, bills, and expense reports this week. Mostly paperwork, but it feels so good to have it done. I have also continued to prepare for the Fall Festival next week. I am working on some signs for the booth.

Mom told me that my nephew fell the other day at the pumpkin patch and busted his bottom lip. Well his cousin, Camille, fell yesterday at the grocery store and busted her upper lip. They have matching swollen lips I am sure. She was walking and holding her purse when her shoes made her stumble. She would have been able to catch herself but she had her purse in her hand. Needless to say she landed on her face. Oh yes blood was dripping down her chin, it was a scene. Thank goodness to my bad of tricks, I had everything we needed to quickly treat the patient at the scene. She was fine within minutes and back to herself with a swollen lip.

I have been very pleased as far as how easy it is to meet people here. Almost easier than it was in Katy. Today I had coffee and croissants with my friend Violet. She is originally from Canada and her husband is from Egypt. They both moved here from upstate New York. They have three children and the middle child is in Evelyn's class. She is an interesting person, she is an art consultant. Next week's social calendar is already filling up. Sunday-coffee with friends, Monday-furniture delivered, Tuesday-so far free, but I have some plans brewing with my friend Kim, Wednesday-built life sized scarecrow with Evelyn's class, Thursday-Fall Festival at school.

I am very thankful for my housekeeper, Anna. She is a hard worker and honest. After she cleaned today, Evelyn invited her to eat with us on the back patio. She excepted and educated me on her way of life in the Philippines. She has a daughter that is still there as well as her husband that she is supporting from work here. Her daughter lives with her mother, and her daughter has a left sided weakness. Last week she received word that her daughter got the Flu and was in the hospital. She was tearing up telling me about it. I feel so sorry for her. She is so helpful to us. After dinner she left and the girls and I went for a walk. On our walk we found some cut down palm branches in front of a villa that I thought I could use for by booth at the Fall Festival next week. I am going to tie them to the pole to make them look like corn fields. Our booth is going to be like a pumpkin patch and we are making a live scare crow. Anyways, after I spoke with the owner of the house if we could have them, Anna was walking near by, she helped us bring all of them back to our house. I never asked her to do that and it was her time off. That was very nice of her. Oh back to her way of life in the Philippines....she built a house next to her parents when she got married, the walls were made out of bamboo and the roof out of leaves. Can you imagine? And here she is in Abu Dhabi, working so hard to support not only her daughter, but her siblings and parents as well.

The weather is getting pleasent outside. The humidity is still high, but there is a nice breeze. It is still warm enough to swim and I think we are going to check out the beach this weekend.

We had a really nice day yesterday. We spent the morning at home while Lance worked on a presentation for work. We left and ate lunch (Pop eyes) on the way into the city. Yes, we do have Pop eyes. Then we went to a birthday party for Evelyn's classmate. They live in an apartment and they had a pool party on their rooftop terrace of the building. It was soo beautiful. It had a great view of the water and city. It was so neat to be at a kids birthday party with all kinds of kids from so many different countries. Evelyn had a great time. We left from there to catch a sunset cruise along the corniche. We rode in a traditional dhow boat (wooden boat) it was so lovely. We took some amazing pictures of the city and sunset. We had the boat all to ourselves. We rode for about 1 1/2 hours. After that we headed to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants in Abu Dhabi for supper. The girls were completely overly exhausted by this time. We went back to the villa and beaded down for the night. Oh by the way, it was our 6 year anniversary.

Today, Sunday, was a teacher inservice day so Evelyn did not have school. It was a nice realizing day at home. Lance went to work as usual and Dennis spent the morning helping us with hanging things in the house. We are so thankful that Dennis helped us with getting things done around the house. It takes so long to get things together and to feel organized. I really feel like since Melinda and Dennis came we have got alot of the last things done to the house and we are now settled. Camille took a long nap today.....trying to catch up from the weekend, so after she woke up we went into the city to meet Lance for supper. Lance ended up working late and wasn't able to meet us, but we had a nice dinner at Fudruckers. They have the best burgers. Definately can not eat that everyday, way too fattening.

I think Melinda and Dennis had a great visit. They are sad to go home, but 2 weeks is a long time to be away from home. We have really enjoyed having them here, it made our new home seem more like home to us. We hope that they can see that we are happy here, and are adjusting well. We are very lucky that they came to visit, because many people that we meet here say that their families would not come to visit them. Goodbye is always the hardest word to say, but this isn't forever and we will see them and all of you before we know it. In about 8 weeks to be exact. Time flies here in Abu Dhabi.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: Melinda and Dennis Delcambre came to Abu Dhabi...Ha HA!! And they survived....

Wednesday was a good day. We did the usually daily things during the day. I brought Evelyn to school and Melinda and Dennis watched Camille. I stayed for a couple of hours at Evelyn's school to observe and help out with the class. It was a good experience. Basically I learned that the teacher does have an agenda, but I do believe that she lacks some structure. It is her teaching style and I am going to make sure that I stay involved with the class. Wednesday evening Lance, Melinda and Dennis went to Emirates Palace. They said it was beautiful. They had a tour of the suite that would cost 50,000 aed a night which is about 13,000 us dollars per night.

Thursday was an early release day for Evelyn. We all brought Evelyn to school, Lance had meetings in Dubai. After dropping Evelyn off, we had breakfast at our usually stop, McDonalds. Then we went to the mall and shopped Ikea. I got several things that we needed for the house...desk, shelves, table for girls and two bookcases, baskets, and more...all for the price of 225 US dollars. Way cheep. That is the only way to go when you move and don't want investment furniture. We picked up Evelyn at 12:30 and went home to rest. At 4:00 PM a Land Cruiser picked us up at our front door and brought us to the dessert for a dessert safari. It was definitely the most exciting and entertaining thing we have done so far. We had no idea how much fun it would be. We first went to a camel farm for some photos with camels. The girls loved it. The camels were very gentle. Then we all loaded back into the 4 wheel drive Land Cruiser and went "dune bashing". I never would have imagined how exhilarating it would have been. The vehicle literally turned at an 90 degree angle going down the dunes. We were screaming our heads off. It felt like the car was going to toll over. I was in the 3rd row with the girls, Evelyn in a seat belt and Camille belted with me. It lasted about 25 minutes then we stopped for sunset photos in the sand. Then we road for about another 25 minutes and then ended at a traditional arabic camp. We rode a camel, had tattoos done on our hands (will wash off eventually), ate traditional arabic BBQ, belly dancing, and smoke shisha pipe. It was really really neat. Everyone had a blast. The girls just loved playing in the sand. Pictures just can not do it justice of how beautiful it is in the dessert. Everyone that comes to visit, we will definitely bring you on a dessert safari.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: Yesterday as we were driving home from school we saw a little Toyota truck with a camel strapped down in the bed of the truck...only in the Middle East....

Yesterday was a good day. We did some things around the house...cook, laundry, etc. and did a little shopping. Lance tried to get the lawn people to cut the grass (which is included in our rent) but they didn't show. They did however end up coming this morning.

After the guys cut the grass, we (Melinda, Dennis, Camille, and I) left for the Sheik Zayed Grand Mosque. It is a beautiful sight. Melinda and I had to wear a black robe over our clothes and wear a scarf over our head. We all including Camille had to take our shoes off before entering the mosque. Inside was unbelievable. It housed the world's largest persain rug, weighing 35 tons. We had a great guide who explained everything and educated us on the muslim customs and why they do the things they do. Melinda and Dennis really enjoyed it. I hope Lance can get the opportunity to see it one day, since we drive by it everyday into the city.

After the mosque we ate lunch, did a little shopping, and picked up Evelyn. We then went to another store and ordered some furniture for myself that I saw the day before. Melinda went to the gold souk (market) below the furniture store and bought herself a nice bracelet. We picked up Pizza Hut for dinner (yes we have that here) and headed home. It was a good day.

Tomorrow, I am going to bring Evelyn to school because Lance has meetings in Dubai. Melinda and Dennis are going to stay home and watch Camille because I am going to stay a couple of hours at Evelyn's school to observe. Tomorrow evening we are going to Emirates Palace, a self proclaimed 7 star hotel. I have made arrangements for Melinda, Dennis, and Lance to take a guided tour that will show them the suite and other things. They do not allow children on this tour so I will keep the girls. We are all looking forward for the weekend as well because we have reservations for an half day dessert safari. It is going to be great...camel ride, dune driving, belly dancing, etc.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: The men here wear a white dress like thing and they wear that color because it is the purest of colors. And they keep it very starched and bright white. Women wear black because you can not see through the fabric, so you would not be able to see what they are wearing beneath. Some women evne wear black veils over their face and you wonder how can they see. We learned today that they can see through the veils, you just can not see them.

I had a very interesting brunch this morning at my Emirate neighbor's house. There were 8 women there total, two of us were American, one Pakistani, and the rest emirate women. I felt like I was in the scene of Sex in the City 2 when the girls go into this room were a lot of Emirate women are dressed in their black robes and head cover. All of the sudden they take their head gear off and kick back. It is so interesting to be among them and to see that they are just normal people like you and me behind their black cover-up. Ms. Salma had a lovely spread of Arabic food and coffee. She gave a tour of her home (it is the same house as mine) but looks totally different because our taste of course is different. She has wallpaper everywhere. Not the terrible 90's wallpaper but current nice wallpaper. The arabic taste is a little on the gody side compared to what we like. They use a lot of rugs of course. I wished I could tell you the name of the foods that I ate, but it was all pretty good. We ate on good china and drank out of crystal glasses of course. Most of the conversations were about normal women talk...kids, school, house, etc. It was like I was in America almost just everyone looked different. I had a hard time following the conversations some times because they would speak in Arabic mostly. The other American woman there could speak Arabic because she is married to an Emirate man. One of the Emirate women reminded me of Jamie (my cousin) she looks just like her and she has 4 boys just like her. Too funny...even in the middle east you find people just alike. One of the Emirate women came with her 20 month old son. She also brought her nanny along with her, who took care of the toddler while we visited. I am thankful that Melinda and Dennis were here to watch Camille for me. She would have been a bull in a china cabinet over there. It would not have been a very pleasant experience. I am so glad to have had that opportunity. It is so interesting to meet and socialize with people I normally would not have.

The rest of the day was a normal Sunday. Groceries and pick up Evelyn from school. We had spaghetti for supper with salad and garlic bread. Nothing too complicated, but it was a hit.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI I realized today that there are more mixed marriages than I would have imagined. Of course I met an American women who looked and dressed just like us that is married to an Emirate man (for 24 years). Also, some of the other women who were dressed in the traditional Emirate gear were not all originally from the UAE. One women was from Yemen and married a man from here. It surprises me to find this mix of marriages, I thought it would have been more strict in that regard. It seems as if they are just like we are in America.

Oh I forgot to mention. Here they do not wear shoes in the house, so I took mine off at the door. When I left, some of the women were still there, I saw their shoes. Nothing but tall hills and name brands...Fendi, gucci, you name it. Also, I was supprised to see when they took of the head gear their hair really wasn't fixed. It was blowdried, but they really didn't style their hair. Why would they it is covered all day except in their homes.

Fun Fun day today. On the way to Dubai we saw even more wild Camels on the side of the road. We stopped this time to take pictures. Dad, I was thinking about you. You wouldn't believe how big they are, and they are not all that camel color, some are darker brownish. Something about the sight of camels just cracks me up.

We had a wonderful time at the water park named Wild Wadi. It is part of the Jumeriah Beach Hotel. Some of you may recognize it, it is the hotel that looks like a sail. The water park was very nice. The girls really enjoyed the wave pool and kiddy part. Evelyn had a great time going down all of the kid slides. I put Camille in a bathing suit that has a life jacket built in. She just bobbed everywhere. She did not stop all day and needless to say they both were exhausted by the end of the day. We all rode the lazy river and we took turns watching kids or riding tube hides. There was also a very high, fast, and steep slide that Lance and Dennis went to ride, but only Lance rode it after they both climbed up the millions of steps. According to Dennis, they wouldn't let him ride the slide with a shirt on so he just didn't ride it. HA HA I think he chickened out. Well at least I can tease him about it. Melinda was worried about what was appropriate to wear at the pool, but I told her don't worry, you will see people dressed from one extreme to another. Of course the Europeans were in the skimpiest things you could imagine. Some should not have worn the small piece of fabric they called a bathing suit. As we would say, they had no business wearing that. Even some men were sporting speedos. OH yes...Then you have the local emirate women in fully covered suits. Imagine swimsuit material...long sleeve shirt that hangs to your knees, pants, and head cover that you only see their faces. It is very weird to see that, but I know that I am settling in when I don't even realize all of the differences. I think today's experience made it hard to believe that we were in the Middle East.

My Emirate neighbor's maid came over this afternoon to invite me for coffee tomorrow morning. As she said it, "My Madame would like to invite you Madame over for coffee tomorrow morning." Since Melinda and Dennis are here, they can watch Camille and I can go over. It is going to be an interesting experience. I'll let you know how it goes.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: It is pretty standard to have a maid's room in a house. We would consider this space a storage closet because of its size. In some bigger and nicer homes, the maid's room is outside of the house, so they have a separate entrance. Some homes even have another servants room designated for the driver. Yes, people have maids and drivers. It is not uncommon to see women (not just emirate) in the grocery store with their maid pushing the cart behind them. Drivers are not as common, but widely used here compared to other parts of the world. Hired help is considerably affordable here compared to elsewhere. No I do not have a live-in maid nor do I have a driver. I do have someone that comes to clean house for me, which is what I had in Katy as well. You can imagine how hard it is to keep up with cleaning a house with all of the sand.

We had a blast yesterday. On our way into Dubai, we saw some wild camels on the side of the road. Too funny. Then once we arrived into Dubai, we went out to the palm island. This is a man made island that is in the shape of a palm tree. In the center of the island is the Atlantis Hotel. It was sooo beautiful. We were able to only see a small portion of the hotel, because they only allow people that are staying in the hotel to access the main parts, but we did eat lunch there in a french restaurant. Lance and Dennis had hamburgers, Melinda had french fries, I had a croissant sandwich, and the girls had fish and chips. It was pretty good. After we left the Atlantis, we went to the Mall of Emirates. I think Melinda and Dennis were amazed to see how beautiful Dubai is. It is hard to believe you are in the dessert. At the Mall of Emirates is the Middle East's only indoor ski slopes. Well, they wouldn't allow Camille to go in, only 3yr olds and up. So Dennis and Lance went down the ski slope, while Melinda and I brought the girls to a large playground. Imagine a larger version of the McDonald's playground, that you have to pay to use. It was sooo crowded on the playground. You kids of course have to be supervised by an adult, but we were the only parents there. All of the kids playing had their nannies with them while their parents shopped. Melinda could not get over the kids with their nannies. Like I said the playground was crowded and Melinda was having a heart attack because she couldn't see Evelyn all of the time. This playground was 4 levels high. We didn't last an hour there and we had enough, so we got ice cream and I brought Evelyn to the Ski Park to play. You see in Ski Dubai there are two different parts, there is the ski slope and the ski park. In the ski park there are tube rides, sled rides, and room to play in the snow. So Melinda watched Camille and they watched from the windows while Evelyn and I went to the snow park. At first Evelyn did not like it because she was cold, but after she started riding rides, she loved it. We kept looking to see if we could see Lance and Dennis skiing, but never saw them. Our snow park adventure ended when Evelyn had to use the bathroom and didn't make it. All of the sudden she said, "Mommy I have to go to the bathroom" and the next thing I knew I could see something wet trickling out of her ski suit and over her boots. When we came out, the gang was right there by the door waiting. Lance and Dennis just got out about 10 minutes before us. Lance and Dennis said they had a great time skiing and only fell down a few times. This was about 6:30 -7:00 pm. Well the next thing we did was go buy Evelyn some new clothes, walked the mall a little, ate supper in the food court, and headed home. We had a fantastic day. We didn't get home until around 11:00 pm. Needless to day we all slept in this morning. It is now 10 am and Lance and the girls are still sleeping. After we all get up, we are going to get ready and go back to Dubai to the Wild Wadi Water Park at the Jumerah Beach Hotel. It is going to be another fun day.

Yesterday was productive for myself. Dogs got groomed and I got my haircut finally. Melinda and Dennis stayed around the house and watched Camille while I ran errands. Last night we went to the Shang Gri La Hotel and shopped at the souk there. A souk is a market, it was a modern twist on a traditional Arabic souk. We shopped a little and ate dinner at a very nice Italian Restaurant. Lance and Dennis ate fish, I had seafood risotto, and Melinda and Evelyn ate a cheese pizza. The food was pretty good. We ran into some friends from the school after dinner and visited with them for a while. They are from Atlanta and the husband is completely hilarious. He has the set up as far as watching American TV and he is trying to teach us how we can do the same. I am so depressed because I can not watch Dancing With the Stars. Not even download it off of the internet, because it is available for US only. We had a really nice evening.

Today we are headed to Dubai, our usually weekend getaway. We are going to The Mall of Emirates and going to the Only indoor Ski slope in the middle east. Dennis is very excited. We plan to show Melinda and Dennis around Dubai a little and show them some of the hi lights of Dubai-The Burj Kalifa (largest building in the world), the sailboat hotel, the Atlantis, the water fountains in front of the Burj Kalifa, etc. We'll let you know how it goes. It is going to be a great day.

We just had our traditional Friday morning breakfast, Pan-a-cakes. Getting ready now to go to Dubai.

Yesterday was a good day. I went back to my doctor to review all of the tests she ran and basically everything is OK, my stomach problem was just a virus. I told her about my wallet being stollen and she had a friend that the very same thing happened to her at the same place a couple of months ago. Knowing that is happened to someone else gives me comfort that I am not the only one.

Melinda and Dennis are having a great time. Dennis is helping with things around the house and Melinda is spending time with the girls. Today Dennis hung Evelyn's curtains and they turned out so cute. If only I had a picture to show you. One day I will set enough time aside to upload some pics.

Tomorrow is Thursday, which is like Friday because it is the last work day of the week. Friday, we are planning on going to Wild Wadi, a water park in Dubai. It is going to be a lot of fun. Well keep you posted on this weekend and all that we do. It will be a blast.

We had a great day today. Melinda and Dennis really enjoyed their first day in Abu Dhabi. We all went to bring Evelyn to school and I think Melinda and Dennis were very impressed. Then I showed them around Abu Dhabi a little bit until we stopped at McDonalds for a breakfast that was familiar to them. We went and picked up a little groceries at Spinneys. Melinda was impressed with the grocery store and she was surprised to see lots of familiar things. Then we headed home for a lunch break and Camille's nap. We all went to pick Evelyn up from school and then I went to the police station to see about my stolen wallet. Basically we found out that if I filed a report it would be a lot of work for nothing. I am mainly concerned about getting my driver's license. I am going tomorrow to see about that. We ended our day at Lance's office. Melinda and Dennis got to meet all of the people working there and what Lance is doing. As Melinda would say...you couldn't slap the smile off of their faces. They both shed a few tears at one time or the other as well. They are so proud to see Lance's new job. One man told Dennis that he was blessed because Lance was here now. He would never have had the opportunities to do the things he is doing without Lance. We are all so proud of him. All and all Melinda and Dennis had a great first day in Abu Dhabi.

Yesterday was a blast. We headed out for Dubai and went to a place called Dragon Mart. It is basically Harwin Street in a mall. The main reason why we went is to look for draped. There are shops that you can pick out your fabric, tell them your window size, and in an hour or few come back and the drapes are made. For a fraction of the cost of custom made drapes. We found some material that we liked for the 4 windows in our living room, but they did not have enough material. We did however, have Evelyn's drapes made. We will definitely be back.

Today I had a very very busy day. Started the day out at the Gulf Diagnostic Center getting and ultrasound of my abdomen. Good news, no gallbladder problems. It appears my stomach problems was merely a bug. I am thankful to God for that. Next I went to exchange an alarm clock that was not working after purchasing it on Thursday of last week. Then the delivery guy called me and said he was going to be at my house in 10 minutes to deliver our patio furniture. I was at least 30 minutes away from home at this point. I called my neighbor and she signs for my patio furniture and they put it in the garage. Then I went to another mall to get some things for the house....Home Center and Ikea. After I finished in those two stores I had one hour until I needed to go pick up Evelyn. (remember Camille is with me this whole time) I decided to go to the supermarket in the same mall and get a few grocery items. When I went to check out from that store, I realized my wallet was missing. I searched everywhere and spoke with all of the security people. The last time I saw my wallet was when I entered the supermarket, I had to get out a Durham to pay for the buggy. The security of the supermarket reviewed the tapes and did not see anything. I can only believe that someone must have taken my wallet out of my purse while I was in the store. You see, the buggies do not have seat belts, so I push Camille in her stroller while I pull the buggy. My purse was hanging from the handle of the stroller right in front of me. If I stepped away from the stroller for a second, I guess someone could have taken it. I searched for a long time and spoke with several people before I gave up the search. In the mean time, Lance called and cancelled all of my cards and someone had already purchased a cell phone with one. It must had been stolen. Believe it or not this is claimed to be a rare thing here. Most people are very honest, plus if they were ever caught stealing the consequences would be way worse. I don't came much about the money lost in my wallet, it is my driver's license that took me a day to get and all of my cards that have to be replaced. Things do not happen quickly here!!!! I am really going to have to dig deep to find some patience. Luckily one of my friends picked Evelyn up from school for me. Well that was today, and tomorrow is a new day. I can't keep beating myself up over this, I just need to move on.

Melinda and Dennis arrived tonight. Everything went well for their flights. They were not that impressed with some of the food, but most people aren't. They are tired and are getting ready for bed which is a good thing. If they can sleep, that would be great. We are thankful to God that they arrived here safely and we are excited to see them.

WHAT'S DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: It is very common to see women with their hair covered. The local women wear all black....a dress that covers their entire arms and almost drags on the ground...they also have a black cover over their hair and some even cover their face...occasionally some with even wear black gloves.

Melinda and Dennis will be here is two days and we just can not believe it. I can not imagine my in laws in the middle east. Lance and I have been working really hard to get everything in order in the house. The guest bedroom has turned out really well.

Evelyn had a really good week at school. She say some glitter stuff for your face last week and really wanted it for her fairy costume for Halloween. Well I told her if she worked on writing her name and could write the entire thing by the end of the week, we would go get it. She is writing her name like a pro. I am so proud of her. Needless to say we have to make a trip to the mall this weekend for the glitter. Not only did Evelyn learn to write her name, but she worked on writing several of her classmates names. She even can now recognize she classmates names and read them. So proud.

I panicked yesterday over the worm/caterpillar invasion in our backyard. They were climbing the walls. After 4 phone calls and Lance going up to the maintenance office the guys finally came and sprayed the yard. We were one of five yards yesterday that they were spraying the gardens.

On top of the worm invasion, the entire compound lost electricity for the entire day yesterday. We were about to make reservations to sleep at the hotel when the lights came back on. The continuous maintenance issues in this villa is very frustrating. A lot of the people in our compound are upset and are considering moving. From what i hear, maintenance issues are very common here in the middle east. Maybe because things are not constructed well or they can not withstand the heat. Probably a combination of the two.

What IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: The other day a milk truck passed by with a logo for Camel's milk. Could this be true? Yes, this is true. I spotted it in the grocery store the other day. Couldn't say I have tried it nor do I plan on it.

I am exhausted this week without Lance.

Yesterday, I got my residency finally. Yeah Yeah. Today, with the help of one of the guys at Lance's office, I got my driver's license. In order to get my driver's license we had to follow these steps:
1. Go to typing center and fill out emirates Id application
2. Go to Mussafah (30 minutes drive) to get Emirates ID picture and fingerprints
3. Get Texas driver's license legally translated into arabic (back to the city)
4. Go get Driver's license (half way back out of the city)

All of this was done today before noon with the help of a man named Leslie. I owe him. It would have taken me two days to find all of the places that we went today.

I am so glad all of that is over. Now I can drive my van. YES! The rental has been good to me, but I am glad to see it go. It was a good car to learn how to drive in Abu Dhabi. I will be honest, it is not exactly going back the way I received it. A few remnants of the tight parking garage are still on the front bumper. It was an honest mistake. We'll see the damages tomorrow.

I started working with Evelyn on writing her name yesterday, and she is doing very well. She can write the entire name as long as she can look at an example. She also colored some pictures for some friends in class and she wrote their names on the pictures. I was so proud of her. She was also able to read their names to me. For example, when I showed her the name Lucas, she could tell me that it said Lucas. I am so very proud of her.

My neighbors 4 doors down lost their entire backyard of grass to a black caterpillar. It only took 3 days the the whole thing was gone. Remember this is not a very big area. Still very disappointing. I noticed some brown spots in the yard this evening and found some caterpillars in the grass and climbing the walls.I immediately called my neighbors. They came over late tonight and sure enough the same worms. I have a call into the service company and hopefully they can come and spray before we loose the entire garden. I am so worried that we are going to loose all of our grass that we just put in.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: There are no child safety laws to my knowledge in regards to children in car seats. I have seen small toddlers sitting in the mother's lap in the front passenger seat of a car. It is not uncommon to see kids pressed against the back windows just bouncing around the back seat while going down the highway. Lance even saw some kids standing up with their heads sticking out of the sunroof going down the highway. This is absolutely crazy. Some companies, etc and trying to promote child safety. This week one of the local radio stations in conjunction with the police are stopping people and rewarding them for driving safely with 750 AED (about 200 US dollars)

Today was a good day. Mostly errands and such. I brought some coloring books from home to Evelyn's teacher so she could see exactly what Evelyn does at home without any distrations, etc.

All of this wonderful weather talk and "it feels like autumn" on facebook makes me straight up depressed. The weather here is getting better, but not like at home. Fall is my absolute favorite time because it means the end of hot weather and the beginning of the holidays soon. This is the time of year that I start my Christmas shopping. Well, the weather here is 70's in the morning and up to 90-l00 by the evening. The humidity is down. It is pleasant outside compared to last month. And I don't feel completely wet when I walk from my car to inside.

I don't know if I have explained before, but our villa is off of the main island. We have a hefty commute to make everyday for school and work. Now that all of the schools are in session and Ramadan is over, the traffic is in full swing. Lance has to leave by 7am to bring Evelyn to school at 8 before he goes to work. The traffic is terrible in the mornings to say the least. And Heaven for bid there is a wreck. Thank goodness Lance brings her to school in the morning and I only have to travel the distance once a day. Plus the traffic is much more pleasant in the evening and I can make it there in 45 minutes with time to spare. This commute is already wearing me out and we have been in our villa for almost a month. I just hope it gets more tolerable and I stop letting it stress me out. This week Lance is in Oman, so I am the morning and evening driver. There is a bus that comes to our compound that we could pay (yes this is an extra cost) if we wanted her to ride, but we think she is too young. I am afraid of her knowing when and were to get on and off the bus. I feel safer driving her.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT IN ABU DHABI: The currency here is called Durham (spelling?) or AED (Arab emirates Durham) as you may have seen me say before. 1 US dollar is equivalent to 3.67 AED. So we have to divide the AED amount by 3.67 to see what it costs in US dollars. For example 100 AED is about $27 US dollars. This is a constant rate, meaning it doesn't change and will never change as an agreement between the UAE and the US. Some people, like those from the UK have to deal with their currency from their home country changing according to the market. So if they went to the ATM and withdrawn 100 AED one day, and withdrew the same amount the next day; it would not be the same amount deducted from their account both days. This becomes a problem with people who are paid their salary in their home country. They have to watch the market and see when it is a good day to exchange.

We had a great weekend.

First, I have to comment on my rampage about Evelyn's teacher. I hoped to meet with her last thursday, but she was not able, so I met her today after school. We talked for about 1 1/2 hours. I now feel like I have a better understanding of what is going on in the classroom and how it is effecting Evelyn. Her teacher is trying to get Evelyn to be self motivated to learn new things. Evelyn will do the work, but she rushes through it so she can move on to the next thing like playing. But once Evelyn sees everyone elses work displayed and how well they did, Evelyn will want her's to be the same. Her teacher commented that Evelyn has improved since the first of the year and she could tell that we were working with her on the issues that arrise. I am still sceptical on the teaching style, but after speaking with her I think it could be really beneficial in Evelyn's case. As far as my thoughts on moving Evelyn to another class, I don't think it would be the best choice. This would only hurt Evelyn in the progress that she has made. It would be like starting all over again. Plus, what kind of message am i sending Evelyn when I move her to a teacher i like better. I think the best course of action is to keep a tight knit with the teacher and what is going on in the class. And try to work on things with Evelyn at home as well that I think need more attention. Next week, while Melinda and Dennnis are here, I am going to sit in one morning to observe the class while Emme and PaPa D watch Camille.

Now Lance and I could honestly say we had more social events this weekend than what we would have in a month at home......Thursday night we went to Dubai to a Nalco party. The girls stayed in Dubai with another Nalco family's two girls and two baby sitters. They did OK, Poopsy cried a bit which just kills me. The party was great, everyone there has just moved here in less than a year. Most of them more like this summer. They all live in Dubai, we are the only Nalco family in Abu Dhabi. And I must say, compared to the other wives, I am doing way better than they are. I don't know if they didn't have enough time to process everything, but they all look like they are in shock. It must be the roads in Dubai. I find it confusing to drive there, esp compaired to Abu Dhabi.
Friday was a quiet day at home and working on hanging picture, etc. Friday night, we had a housewarming party three doors down. Anna, our housekeeper, kept the girls. I put Camille to bed before we left and Evelyn and Anna watched movies. The girls did great. The party was fun as well. The couple is from Norway and most of their friends were as well. We met some really interesting people and had a great time. They were really great hosts and have done a lovely job setting up their house.

Saturday we were back off to Dubai to do some shopping. We didn't get to all of the places we wanted but did make some headway. The malls are so crowded on the weekend. It gets crazy.

Today I had my appoitment with a GP for my stomach. She was really really good. she doesn't think it is my gallbladder. Thank you God. She thinks I have some kind of stomach bug. She is going to run some tests just to make sure....bloodwork and ultrasound. She also put me on a bland diet and gave me a prescription for something like pepto.

I think of things often that I want to tell you about that are different and interesting here in Abu Dhabi. So I thought at the end of each blog I would put a few lines of Different Things In Abu Dhabi. The thoughts for today: did you know that the speed limit etc is not in miles/hour, but KM/Hour. The speed limit on the main highway between Abu Dhabi and Dubai is 100 KM/HR, which is about 70 miles per hour. Things are measured differently here, like instead of inches and feet they use cm and meters. So instead of a rug being a 5 X 7 it is 150cm X 240cm I think. The fruit, veggies, and meat are measured in Kilograms in the grocery store, so if I want to buy a pound of meat it would be 2.2 KG or I just say 2 kilos.

Well last night I woke up in my sleep with stomach cramps around my diaphragm region. I was dry heaving, sweating, chills, weak, etc. It put me to the ground in the fetal position. Over about an hour it let up and went away. The very same thing happened to me about a month ago. I thought I might had eaten something that upset my stomach. But it is funny how it happened twice now. I am beginning to wonder if it is my gallbladder. It is real common for women to develop gallbladder problems after they have babies. I am asking around to see about doctor recommendations and I am going to get it checked out. The rest of the day today I was tired and a little weak. I just hope I don't have another attack.

Well I think it was yesterday that I mentioned how Evelyn was monopolizing the "house" station in school. You can not imagine how it has been eating me up. Look, I am the first one to admit that my sweet little Evelyn is...well...you know...spoiled. And the good Lord above knows how hard I try to teach her the right things. We aren't all perfect right, but at least we try our best. It is so completely embarrassing to know that your child is causing problems. I was talking to Lance about the whole class situation and I have been making note about how things are run. Basically, Evelyn's teacher is running it like a Montessori program. The kids choose whatever they want to do. There is a definite lack of structure in this class. When I pick her up in the evenings, there are kids running all over the place and I have to hunt Evelyn down. Evelyn needs structure and boundaries; her teacher is not doing this. On top of it all, Evelyn has not brought home one thing since school has started to show what she is doing academically. No worksheets, etc. Oh, I take it back this week she brought home a small book that she made about the letter E. But that is it. If any of you know Evelyn you can understand that she needs to be in a structured environment.

Well as all of these thoughts are running through my head I meet another mom from Evelyn's class today. She has been completely outraged with the lack of teaching period in their class. As she said it, they are bored, and when they are bored they get bad. She (Violet) said her son comes home everyday talking about how other kids were bad. When I asked Evelyn today about what she did in class: do you sit at your tables and do worksheets or do you do whatever you want? Her reply- We do whatever we want to do mommy. Hum... Violet has been to the principle etc about this matter. Her son is academically advanced and is completely wasting his time in this class. The teacher sent out an email stating that she has evaluated each child and will divide them up into groups depending on their needs; then she will work with each group. Now how is she going to do that with 20 4 yr olds. And while she is with one group what are the others doing? Sounds like Montessori to me.

I called one of my friends tonight and her son is in other class in the same grade. They are doing way more than we are. She has worksheets that go home to work on writing his name. She even had a worksheet that went home over the Eid break to work on some pre writing. I haven't seen anything like that. Each class has pets as well and both of the other class rooms the kids take turns bringing home one of the pets (turtle, hamster). We don't do that. Our class bulletin board is supposed to have life size paper people for each child that they created. Out of the 20 we only have 3. The other class rooms have all kinds of things on their bulletin boards and you can clearly see that every child in their class did the projects. Not just the one's who wanted to do it.

I am pondering over what I should do about all of this. I don't want our time to be wasted. Plus I don't want Evelyn to have the wrong impression about what she does at school. I am afraid that she is not going to learn much as this rate and she will be in for a rude awakening next year. I definitely don't want to cause problems or burn bridges, so I have to handle this delicately. The first course of action is for Lance and I to have a conference with the teacher and try to better understand exactly what is going on in the class. I'll keep you posted.

Today was a good and preductive day. I love those kinds of days.

Now that I have my residency papers, the last step is a medical check. I guess to make sure I am not bringing any infectious diseases into their country. Well imagine a medical facility packed with middle easterns. Crazy crazy crazy. In this country money talks, esp for things like this. Instead of waiting in the lines, I paid extra money to have a "fast track". Basically that means I go to the front of the line while everyone else waits. It only cost 100 AED which is about $27 US. Thank goodness I paid, because I had Camille with me as well and she certainly would not have wanted to wait. I was through in no longer than 30 minutes..that is an exam (she asked me three questions), blood work, and a chest xray. Tomorrow I can pick up my results and send everything in to get my official residency stamp on my passport. So I hold an US passport, but on one of the pages it is completly dedicated to my UAE residency. The page has a picture of me and all of my residency info. Lance already went through this process and thank goodness the girls do not have to do a medical exam.

Well after my medical screening, I headed to the Marina mall for some shoptherapy. ha ha. One thing I don't think I have mentioned is that the grocery store is in the mall. Well the supermarket called Carrefour which is the French version of Walmart. Too funny, we live in the UAE, the supermarket if from France so all of the labels are in French. The UAE has added an additional sticker on items explaining what the item is in arabic and english. So you can basically get everything and anything at the mall...the appliance store, furniture store, grocery store, restaurants, clothes of course, you can pay your utility bill, phone bill, hardware store, etc. It is too hot and crowded to have seperate stores so they put them all together in a mall. That is why Abu Dhabi has like 8+ malls on this small island. Island? Yes, Abu dhabi is an island.

Another interesting thing here is you have to pay for you buggy (trolly as they would call it)at the grocery store. All of the buggies are connected together by chain and you have to put a coin into your buggy and it will release the chain. When you return the buggy after your shopping you get the coin back. Most of the time there is a guy hanging around the parking lot that will gladly take your buggy back for you because he wants your coin (about a quarters worth). Poor things, I gladly let them take my buggy, that durhaim means more to them than it does to me. Plus who wants to walk their buggy back in the heat?

I am back

Thank you God..We finally have internet as of today. I can finally get back in touch with everyone. We have missed skyping with everyone and writing on this blog of course.

So much has happened over the past 2+ weeks. We are moved into our house now. All of the shipments have arrived and all of the boxes are unpacked. We are in decorating mode now...hanging curtians, pictures, etc. One major problem that we have run into is closet space. Or the lack of. We are shifting things and trying to make the lack of storage space work. The girls are both sleeping wonderfully in their rooms. I can tell it made them feel like home once their things arrived. You wouldn't believe how well they play with their toys after not seeing them for 2+ months. The dogs are adjusting well. Esp since we put the grass in the back yard. Ruffles could not stand to walk in the sand.

Now to hit the hilights of the past few weeks:

The first night we stayed in our house the Emirate family next door had their maid bring over a tray with a pitcher of arabic coffee with two cups. Too cool. Lance and I loved it. The arabic coffee tastes like a cross between tea and coffee. The following weekend was Eid (the end of Ramadan) which is like Christmas for the muslims. The Emirate family next door sent us a tray as well that weekend with a bowl of fruit, dates, and arabic sweets. Too nice. But the hilight of that weekend was the 2010 Lamborgini infront of thier house. The 23 year old son said he bought it, but after the weekend the car was gone. Evidently he rented it for the weekend for show. Well Eid is the time for giving to the children. They don't give presents just money and the kids go buy whatever they want with the money. The son gave Evelyn 1,000 AED which is about $270 US for Eid. We could not believe it. We are going to use the money for something to play on in the backyard for the girls. Needless to say the Emirate neighbors are really nice and we are glad to get to know them.

Speaking of neighbors, we have so many lovely people living around us. We have people from Norway, Spain, France, South Africa, US, UK, etc. all in our one block of our compound. We have gotten to know them very quickly and are actually attending a party with them this weekend. The Norwegans are having a house warming party.

Lance got his car and loves it. My van arrived at the port last week and by the end of the week we got it and had it registered to Abu Dhabi. It was a very stressful week trying to get that done. The day we went to pick it up at the port in Dubai was one for the books. Lance and I got lost several times. When we finially got to the van the battery was dead. If it could have gone wrong it did. Well my van looks great parked infront of the house, but I can not drive it yet. I just got my residency today and now can work to get my driver's license. You see, I can not drive a privately owned car with a foreign driver's license. I can drive a rental though. Maybe by the end of this week I will be set and can drive my car. I did not realize how much I missed it. We were all so excitted to see the van.

Maintenance issues with the house are still ongoing. We have to date lost water 3 times since we moved in. The service was very prompt and fixed it with in an hour all three times. Electrical issues arrise every now and them, but all in all things are getting ironed out.

Evelyn is loving school, but having some problems including all of her friends. Her and another girl named Anna take over the "house" station and don't allow any other kids play there. Needless to say we are working on feelings and how the things we do make others feel. She is coming around and her teacher told me she is getting better about sharing.

Camille is walking all over the place. She gives kisses all the time. She still sleeps with her pappy, but as soon as we get her up from her bed, she takes it out of her mouth and throws it into her bed. Too cute. She also feeds herself with a fork if we load it for her. She is saying a little more...like baba for baby and making animal sounds. Her hair is getting longer and she is thinning out sice she started walking. The funniest thing is some clothes that were in her closet in Katy do not fit her now. Same for Evelyn.

Well keep checking cause I have a lot to get you caught up on. I have to say it again, I am so glad that I have internet.